Field
The present application relates to apparatuses and methods for humeral implants and trial humeral implants.
Description of the Related Art
A typical anatomical shoulder joint replacement attempts to mimic anatomic conditions. For example, a humeral stem and a humeral head replacement are attached to the humerus of the arm and replace the humeral side of the arthritic shoulder joint. The humeral head replacement can articulate with the native glenoid socket or with an opposing glenoid resurfacing device.
For more severe cases, the standard treatment is a reverse reconstruction, which includes reversing the kinematics of the shoulder joint. A reverse shoulder prosthesis can be provided by securing a semi-spherical device (sometimes called a glenosphere) to the glenoid and implanting a humeral stem with a cavity capable of receiving the glenosphere.
Before implanting the humeral implant, it may be desirable to trial the humeral implant to determine an appropriate length of the stem, appropriate inclination angle of the articulating head, and/or size of the articulating head, or other characteristics of the implant. The trial humeral implant can be assembled and then inserted into the humerus. Afterwards, the entire trial implant can be removed, and the definitive humeral implant can be chosen and implanted in the bone.